Waiting to Live
by MacyBear17
Summary: After something happens at the Battle of Hogwarts, Harry is left without his Hermione to stand by him... what will become of him now? Can he ever bring Hermione back? He is waiting for her to come back to him... waiting by her side. Waiting to live.


_**A/N: Okay guys... so this is my first HP fic, please be gentle with me. I am a firm Harmony shipper and I hope I've done justice to the characters. **_

_**So go ahead and Enjoy! And don't forget to review your thoughts and ideas.**_

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><p>The young man sitting in the Wingback chair stared into the fireplace. Like always, it was cold. Just ashes heaped onto the dirty grate... cold, empty and... dead. Much like his life. If someone had not been told that he was a young man, it would have been difficult for anyone to know. Most people who looked upon him could not get beyond the emptiness of his eyes... the flat lifelessness that got to them never let them look beyond it to the man himself. The lifeless eyes spooked them so much that no one even bothered to get to know more. The body was of a eighteen year old young man... but the eyes carried so much in them... so much pain, so much suffering and so much of the weight of the world when they weren't flat and lifeless, that it would be difficult to acknowledge the fact that they did in fact belong to a eighteen year old body.<p>

It was ironic that the eyes that had held so much life, so much love inside them, were as flat and cold now as they had never known life before. The green in them so bright and lush with life not a year ago, was now a dull, jade, revealing nothing but immense pain, emptiness and a cold hardness that seemed akin to the gemstone that their color had been equated to a long time ago.

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><p>She had loved the color of his eyes. They had probably been what had caught her attention first. Even before the scar on his forehead. She told him much later... the first thing she had noticed about him when she had entered the compartment on the Hogwarts Express with Neville Longbottom on the pretext of helping him find his toad, had been his brilliant green eyes. Eyes which had caught and held her attention. Eyes which had haunted her dreams for years to come. Eyes, which had taken firm residence in the confines of her heart.<p>

Back then, when she'd been called a buck-toothed, bushy haired know-it-all, no one had paid the slightest attention to how much he noticed her. After all, he was the Boy-who-lived. Why would he want to be with someone like her? Someone who wouldn't let him do worse than what he was capable of, someone who wouldn't let him slack off on anything. Someone, who expected him to do what was necessary... not what was expected of him. Had he not been a stupid and uncaring boy of eleven, twelve, thirteen and so on, he might've understood the importance of what she had been trying to make him understand every year. But of course, he hadn't. And how he wished now that he had.

Maybe if he had listened even once, they wouldn't be in the situation they were right now.

That he had noticed her from the first day did not seem out of place to him. Not when the first thing he had noticed about her were her eyes. Those beautiful caramel colored eyes, bright with equal parts excitement and nervousness had stared back into his on that day and made an indelible impression on his heart and mind.

He might not have understood what was happening, might not have known that he was making more than a friend that day, but he was bright enough to know that she wasn't going to be just another friend. His brain had told enough to his heart for him to understand that whoever she was, she was going to be special... to him at least. He was least bothered about other people. As it is, he had a whole bunch of people coming around trying to get a glimpse of his scar like it was something on display in a museum... The fact that neither she nor the boy with her had deliberately stared at it when they heard his name was a major plus in their account.

Those eyes had been his constant companions for the whole journey... till the very end. Her caramel eyes with those beautiful gold flecks in them had given him strength when he needed it, comfort when he was down, warmth when he was cold and quiet affection and a conviction that she would always be there whenever he'd felt all alone in the world.

Back in first year, it had been the fear in her eyes that had spurred him on to get onto the back of the troll and stick his wand up its nose. Something he might never have done had he not seen the amount of fear that she had been suppressing. Second year, all those hours he had spent by her bedside holding her hand and talking to her when she had been petrified, were deemed hours extremely well spent when she at last opened her eyes and looked at him. The expression in them, the gratitude coupled with relief, the vast amounts of pride at his achievements, the affection for a friend and something more... something that forever hid in her eyes, to only be revealed to him... and him alone.

In third year of course... he'd had to witness those same eyes look at him with disapproval when he'd fought with her about the stupid broom. Of course, it was a firebolt, of course it had been a present from Sirius. But with the information she had, she'd made the perfect, correct decision and he'd fought with her for it. Had Sirius really been out to kill him, like they had thought back then, he'd have been dead meat before the third year ended. Till this day, he couldn't really forgive himself for having disagreed with her just because he had been a thickheaded idiot who'd valued a broomstick over a best friend.

Fourth year had proved to be both a hellish torture and a godsend. The Triwizard Tournament had made life hell for him... but also provided him with the opportunity to spend more time with her when Ron had abandoned them. Ron had quickly proved his inconsistency over the years... proving to be what people called a 'fair weather friend'. When things went his way, Ron was a great friend and a fun guy to hang out with but if things were going wrong, Ron wasn't the guy you wanted in your camp.

He had found out exactly how much she'd changed from the busy haired eleven year old witch he'd seen on the Hogwarts Express when she'd come down the stairs of the girls dormitory dressed in the beautiful blue robes for her date with Krum. That night something had changed... It was as if something that he'd steadfastly refused to acknowledge till then had broken through. He'd never looked at her as a girl... a beautiful girl before then. She'd just been a friend, albeit his best friend and maybe something more... but he couldn't think about it. Couldn't think about her like that when he had a death sentence hanging over his head like it did.

Bringing his burgeoning feelings into this already messy situation might just derail the whole thing. If there was one thing he knew with absolute certainty, it was the fact that he couldn't get through this without her by his side. She had been a friend, confidante, companion, supporter and teacher that year. Not only had she held her own in almost everything they had come across, she had also borne his weight across her own slim shoulders. She had literally propelled him through the year single handedly. Yet, he hadn't done much more than give her more to worry about.

The last three years of their lives had been as much a nightmare as one could possibly go through. He was the one who had a power hungry madman after his life... not her. Yet, she had chosen to stay with him every step of the way, going as far as giving up her own family for that. Her golden eyes had stayed by his side right through Order meetings, DA meetings, classes with Umbridge, while he fought his own monsters, through his splitting headaches, through losing Dumbledore, losing his faith... first in Dumbledore and then in everything, the horcrux hunt... even while Ron, her then sort-of boyfriend had left them in the lurch, right up to the last moment during the final battle at Hogwarts.

He knew that she had subconsciously already known about it... about him being the last horcrux. About him having to willingly die by Voldemort's hand if he had to make sure that the world would be forever free of the mad wizard's menace. She had known and one look at his face had told her that he too knew of it. That moment, when both of them had faced the fact that he would have to die that night was probably the most excruciating moment of their lives. At seventeen years old, he had finally come to the end of the road... and he hadn't even told her that he loved her more than he could ever express.

They hadn't needed words that evening. They had almost never needed words to communicate... their eyes could do it all for them. It was one of the points on which Ron had always remained jealous about. The way they could communicate whatever they wanted just by a single glance. That evening, her eyes had finally been able to show him, to tell him exactly what had remained hidden deep inside their hearts for so long. And to his endless torment, only his eyes had spoken back to her that night. He had never once opened his mouth to tell her the words. He'd never told her how much he loved her... Now it didn't matter. She was not there and his eyes were empty... of tears, of feeling, of life... of everything.

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><p>The young man sat still, staring at the fireplace, but it was easy to see that he was actually looking at something else... his mind was somewhere else... maybe in some other time. He hadn't been heard for a long time now. From the night of the battle at Hogwarts to be specific. Nobody had been able to get him to speak yet but it was not from lack of trying on their part. In his mind, he could still hear her voice. The one voice he could easily pick out of a whole crowd. The one voice he knew better than his own... his voice of reason. The reason he was still sane, still alive. Though without her voice to keep him alive now, he didn't know how he would survive anymore.<p>

He could remember clearly as it had happened just the day before. Back in first year, she'd chattered on and on in nervousness all the way during the boat ride and the walk into the castle. While one of his earlier friends had found her irritating and intrusive, he himself had found her voice a calming influence on him. The constant tones of her mellifluous voice had washed over him like a wave of warmth and he knew... even back then he knew that he wanted to hear her for the rest of his life. Of course, to a boy of eleven, with so many new things bombarding his life every second, it had been a momentary and confusing revelation. One that pierced his heart like a rusty iron nail nowadays. Because he knew that he wouldn't be able to listen to her voice whenever he wanted anymore.

She'd always been his voice of reason. The one who always had a plan. The one who always got him out of all the trouble he seemed to find himself in. Her voice had been the only thing that had been able to bring him back to sanity whenever he had been consumed by Voldemort's hatred due to their mental connection. Hearing her soft voice recite proper spell pronunciation made up for the lack of normality in their lives during the war riddled last couple of years. They had never stopped studying, even while on the run, basically because she had thought it would help and he agreed with her... completely. Being able to hear her soft, lilting voice fill the tent was just a bonus.

He remembered almost everything she'd ever said in his presence. It was because of this that he had passed most of his classes at Hogwarts. She would read or recite something and he would automatically pay attention and pick it up. He'd never told her about it and she'd given him a lot of grief through the years about not studying at all, but always scoring high enough on his exams for him to always be second to her in their house. She'd never figured it out and he wished he could tell her all about it now. He'd always heard her... even if he hadn't always listened. Right up to the moment when he's heard her scream his name... then... nothing.

The world had become silent for him, her voice being absent for so long that his own seemed to have died along with it. No one had been able to get him to speak and he knew that no one would be able to... ever again. He hadn't used his voice in time to tell her he loved her and now he never wanted to use his voice for anything else ever.

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><p>Closing his eyes, he could almost smell her signature vanilla and coconut shampoo. Her hair, which every one called put of control and bushy, he loved. Her curls had always smelled of vanilla and coconut and it had taken him quite a long time to understand that he'd come to associate the scent of vanilla with her in his mind. Even while they'd been on the run, she'd always managed to smell... beautiful.<p>

He knew that smells couldn't be called beautiful, but somehow, he felt that the way she always smelled - of parchment, ink, new books, vanilla, a hint of peppermint and something sweet and flowery that he had never discovered, was always beautiful to him. She'd always smelt like... her. There was no other way to describe it. Not one day, not during one hug had she managed to smell different.

Among all the different smells at Hogwarts, at Grimmauld Place, at the tent, wherever they were, her signature scent had been the one that grounded him. Feeling her next to him and knowing that she would always be there had made him do things that he might never have had the courage to do had he been alone. She had given him the strength of purpose and determination to see this whole debacle through, from start to end. Only, she hadn't been there at the end to stand next to him... and she never might again. She still smelled the same, but he would never again be able to breathe in the scent of her hair when she hugged him tight in one of her patented bone crushing hugs.

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><p>He was cold... from the inside. Ever since the night of the battle, his skin had gone cold, he'd almost frozen to death. Nothing anyone did could warm him up. He remained cold... frozen almost. Potions, blankets, hot food, chocolate... nothing could even remotely start making a difference. At the end of everything, he remained cold. It was almost as if his inner life, his warmth... the flame that he'd carried around inside his heart had gone out. Just like the fire in his eyes.<p>

His skin had always been pale, now it became almost paper white. He'd never left the house... almost never left the room for anything other than going to the loo or taking a bath. Grimmauld Place had become home, but not in a good way. He never left the last bedroom on the top floor... her room, the room she'd liked so much when she'd stayed here summers during the war. The room now contained a comfortable four poster bed, it's occupant lying perfectly pale and still in the middle, two Wingbacked chairs and a side table. The fireplace was almost never lit and nothing in the room suggested that anyone inside was even alive.

Most of the time, he sat with her cold, thin hand inside both of his. Trying futilely to channel some of his inner warmth, which itself was missing along with hers, to her cold, still body. He could still feel her next to him most of the time. It was almost as if she'd never left him... he could still feel her soft, small hand slip into his so naturally at times. Still feel her tight, breath robbing, bone crushing hugs that he loved so much... still feel her warm breath on the curve of his neck and shoulder whenever she hugged him like that, still feel the calluses on her fingertips from so much writing when she used to touch his cheek in an affectionate gesture.

He could still feel the warmth and strength she'd given him time and time again just when he'd needed it. He just wished that he could return the favor and do the same to her now that she needed him so much. His inability to do so for the last so many months had literally broken his spirit... the spirit that couldn't be broken by Voldemort was now in shreds, torn apart by the visceral agony he'd felt the moment he knew she'd been felled by a curse. One that had originated from someone that they'd all believed was fighting for them, by their side. She had been hit by a complex curse from Molly Weasley's wand, moments after they had defeated Voldemort.

The woman who'd treated them as her own children when she'd first come to know them... or so they had thought, had gone out of her mind when she saw that her dream of one big Weasley family was crumbling before her eyes. The grief of losing one of her children, Fred, and the disappointment of having her lifelong dream taken away, one that she had worked tirelessly towards, even going as far as dosing the two of them with love potions tied to her two youngest children, had destroyed the red haired woman's control... a really old and impossibly complex curse had lit out of the woman's wand and struck her intended target moments into their victory celebrations. Someone had unfortunately reacted with keen battle reflexes and Molly Weasley was killed seconds after, without anyone ever finding out what the curse had been.

They'd just turned to each other... finding the other after the battle was finally over. He could still feel her soft lips on his, finally able to express themselves the way they had wanted to. He'd never expected her to react in such a way, not to say that he'd never thought about kissing her. He had, in intricate detail and at embarrassing length. He'd dreamed about it countless times during their year on the run. Thinking that she was in love with Ron had stayed him from attempting anything that could be considered as romantic during that year. But knowing what he did now, he could hardly stop himself from gathering her up in his arms and holding her tight to him. He's wanted to capture her lips with his to express just what he hadn't been able to before, but she'd just pipped him to the post, looping her arms tight around his neck and pulling him the scant few inches down to her waiting lips just for a few incredible seconds before she had stiffened as the curse hit her squarely in the back.

She'd tasted sweet, soft, warm and familiar. It amazed him that he could remember so much about her at that moment... but nothing that was not her. His whole being as so focused on her that he had failed to understand what was happening until it was all over. He could remember tasting her tears, both sad and happy in her kiss, he could remember the way her body just fit with his like they were made to be like that forever, like two pieces of a puzzle clicking together. He could remember the soft sigh that escaped her lips, sounding like the most beautiful noise in the world, the way her hands tightened in his wild hair as he'd licked her bottom lip. He remembered everything and wished somedays that he didn't. That one kiss had been the source of both heavenly delight and hellish torment in his life. He spent half his time happy that he'd been able to feel her lips on his atleast that one time and the rest of the time cursing fate that he might never feel it again.

So deeply involved was he in his thoughts of her that he'd failed to hear his uncle Remus and his wife Tonks enter the room. They were regular visitors, part of the handful that believed, like him, that she would recover. Nowadays he oscillated between firm belief and complete hopelessness. Today, he was fast reaching the territory of hopelessness. He might not have even looked up to acknowledge them had he not heard the sound. A gasp.

Whirling, he could see that the slim again Tonks had her hand at her mouth, looking extremely astonished at something while Remus was busy leaning down to the figure on the bed, as if checking something. Hurriedly, he got up from the seat he's come to regard as his habitual thinking place now, and almost sprinted over to her bedside. What he saw over there stilled not only his feet but also his heart.

For a split second, his heart literally stopped in his chest, before restarting with a vengeance. He'd never felt his heart beat like it did now, like it was trying to beat for the both of them. The slight, pale figure on the bed was breathing regularly as she had been for almost three months now. The only difference that was apparent today was the fact that there was a slight frown upon the angelic face that he knew as well as his own. As he stared, she gave a slight, almost inaudible murmur and frowned once again, this time deeper than before. She was trying to wake up... His sleeping beauty was finally waking up after three long, hard, lonely months.

He was on the bed and at her side in a second, her hand in his once again, as he moved some stray strands of her beautiful honey colored hair off her face, cupping her gaunt cheek in a simple gesture of deep affection that wasn't missed by the older couple who shared a happy smile at the developments. A couple of seconds later, her eyes opened sleepily. The caramel eyes that had taken hold of his heart so many years ago stared into his green ones. His eyes, which had been empty, cold and lifeless not seconds ago, were a sparkling and lively green again.

"Remus!.. Tonks... She's awake!"

"Oh Merlin!... I'm gonna go tell everyone the news... you guys take all the time you want. I'll give you guys some time before I get everyone else in here okay?"

He took two seconds to nod thankfully at the woman who'd become not only his aunt, but also his friend and biggest supporter during the last couple of months, before his eyes found themselves gravitating to her caramel ones again, which were open and looking back at him with a wealth of expression that he'd thought he would never be able to see again.

"H-Ha..rry..."

"Shh... Mione. Don't worry about anything... everything's fine now. I'm here and I won't let anything take you away."

She smiled, her face creasing into a tired, but loving expression and twined her fingers with his as he bent down to press a soft kiss on her forehead, nose and finally her lips.

"Wh..at happened?" she whispered with difficulty, her voice weak and thready from disuse.

"Don't worry about anything now. We'll have plenty of time to talk about everything later. Forever in fact... There's just one thing I wanna say now" he replied in an equally weak and cracking voice

She appeared curious as the sound of his voice penetrated her exhausted brain but thankfully refrained from questioning him about it even though he could see that she was literally squirming to ask.

"I love you Mione. I am so so sorry that I couldn't tell you bef-"

This time she pressed a finger to his lips, stopping his explanations

"Shhh... You said it. I heard it. That's what matters... We can talk about everything else later." she repeated his own words to him, smiling shyly.

"Harry?"

"Yes love?"

"I love you too... more than I can tell you"

"I know love... me too. Forever... nothing will ever keep us apart form now on"

Leaning back to look at her properly, he took her other hand in his

"Mione... I'm going to ask you to marry me when you get better. I am going to spend the rest of my life showing and telling you how much I love you and the family we'll have one day. I've wasted too much time and lost too damn much in life to waste even one more moment with you."

The radiance of her smile was only matched by the radiance of her eyes. They literally glowed like jewels, filled with crystal tears as they looked back at him, showering him with so much love and happiness that Harry felt he could die this moment and die happy.

"And I will say yes. I couldn't say anything else my love... We both fought death to come back to each other. And I will make sure that you stay by my side for the rest of eternity."

"Forever and beyond my Mione... "

"Forever and beyond my love..."

Their lips met in a soft, sweet and infinitely beautiful kiss that extended for a long minute. This was how they were found by the rest of their family, as an excited and happy Nymphadora Tonks forgot her promise to Harry and swept into the room with Remus, Andromeda, Teddy, George and Angelina, Neville and Luna, Bill and Fleur, Percy and Penelope, Charlie, Hagrid, Professor MacGonagall and a tired but happy looking Madame Pomfrey.

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><p><em><strong>AN: So there it was. My first HP/HG fic. **_

_**Hope you guys liked it... Please review your thoughts and comments... Your feedback is like lifeblood for us writers.**_

_**So tell me if you liked it... tell me even if you didn't, but make sure to review and leave your thoughts about this story.**_

_**Lotsa luv and cookies**_

_**Macybear**_


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